Social Media: Are You Building on Borrowed Ground?

For brands, social media is a minefield. As we’ve seen in the past 15 years, social networks can come and go practically overnight. It’s hard to develop a media plan when you’re unsure about a channel’s long-term viability.

As we’ve seen in the past 15 years, social networks can come and go practically overnight. It’s hard to develop a media plan when you’re unsure about a channel’s long-term viability.

Social networks themselves are becoming less and less brand-friendly, as well.

This is all part of their business model, of course. First, they build an audience by getting people addicted to their platform, and brands follow—investing in the kind of content that will gain them likes and followers. Once the social networks reach a critical mass of brand users, they dial back those users’ organic reach.

Eventually, the platform becomes less social and more of a “pay to play” environment.

So what’s the solution? How do you provide social features that enhance trust and increase revenue on media that you own?

For a large and growing number of companies, a branded community is the answer. Communities enable brands to become less dependent on paid media, while building better relationships with their customers.

As these 10 stories show, communities help turn customers into brand advocates. Customer communities help brands provide better service, get more loyal customers, and increase conversion rates by up to 400%.

In addition, communities produce a wealth of user-generated content—the kind that search engines love. This “long tail” of real human discussions can provide a substantial SEO boost: Sonos, for example, has received more than 5M visits toits communityfrom organic search.

Curious to learn how your brand could benefit from a branded community?Get started with our free ebookto read success stories from 10 real brands—including some of the biggest telecom operators in Europe.

Share this article:

Share this article:

Bart Meerdink

Social Business Strategist at inSided, injecting social into brands like KPN, SoundCloud, T-Mobile and Eneco. Humanizing digital is a common theme in his work, and in his belief the only relevant differentiator in an increasingly automated world.
Connect on LinkedIn

Learn more

Learn more about the power of conversations via our webinars, case studies and other resources.